Amnesia victim learns his identity

Parents recognized state man on TV

Published 10:00 pm, Sunday, October 22, 2006

DENVER -- A man who found himself in Denver not knowing who he was or how he got here was identified Sunday after his parents saw a television report about him.

Denver police said the man known only as "Al" is actually Jeff Ingram, 40, of Olympia.

Ingram suffers from a rare medical disorder known as dissociative fugue, police said.

Detective Ken Klaus said Ingram is relieved about discovering who he is but is still extremely frustrated because he has little or no memory and can't even identify photographs of relatives that have been shown to him.

Dissociative fugue is a disorder in which a person can't remember some or all of his past life. It affects about two out of 1,000 people in the United States, according to medical manuals, and tends to surface in people who've been through a traumatic event such as a natural disaster, a horrific accident or war. Dissociative fugue can occur once or multiple times.

Ingram had been missing since Sept. 6 when he started a road trip from his home in Olympia to visit relatives in Alberta, Canada, said Virginia Quiqones, a Denver police spokeswoman.

She told the station that Ingram had a similar amnesia incident in the mid-1990s.

Last week, before being identified, Ingram said he awoke the morning of Sept. 10 on a sidewalk in front of a downtown office building. He had no wallet or identification and only $8 in his pocket. Not knowing who he was or how he came to be in Denver, he walked to Denver Health Medical Center. The staff did physical and mental evaluations.

"I believe it is a medical condition," Klaus said. "I don't believe he tried to hide from anyone for anything."